The Corvinus University won the Archives of the Year 2022 Prize  

According to the explanation, the Corvinus Archives earned the prize with their high-standard professional work of several decades, their embeddedness in the life and the research at the University, their high-standard exhibitions, conferences and publications and outstanding services. They also received HUF 1 million offered by the National Cultural Fund for the development of the archives.    

In her words of welcome at the award ceremony, Ágnes Zsóka, Vice Rector for Academic Developments at the University emphasized that high-standard professional work had been going on for decades in the Corvinus Archives. The volume of documents is 900 document linear meters, which are actively looked after by the committed staff of the organisation to make sure that source materials are easily available to researchers and students.  

István Kenyeres, President of the Associate of Hungarian Archivists (MLE) said that in odd years, the MLE prize is awarded to one of the small archives – selected from municipal, church and higher-education institutions –, while in even years, organisations with high staff numbers may apply for the prize. 

The oldest document in the collection of the Corvinus is from 1891. The collection consists of own official documents and private documents related to the institution, and one third of the material is made up by the so-called student study records (e.g. registers, minutes of state examinations). In addition, there are five thousand photos, as well as the heritage of several professors, including Rudolf Andorka and Kálmán Szabó Rectors and Gyula Germanus researcher. Since 2018, the staff of the Archives have been building oral history archives, too, they have discussions with Iván T. Berend,, Géza Jeszenszky, Júlia Király, György Surányi, Mihály Simai, Attila Chikán and Zsolt Rostoványi, among others, Last year more than 500 pages of high-level university history monographs edited by the staff of the Corvinus Archives were published. The head of the Archives, Vilmos Zsidi, received the Pauler Prize in 2020, which is the highest state recognition in the profession. Presently, they are working on the compilation of the student history database of 1920-1948, and on the digitalisation of the minutes of board meetings. 

The Associate of Hungarian Archives – already at the 11th time since its foundation in 2012 – awards the prize to archives that pursue outstanding professional activities in the given year. The prize was handed over as a feature of the Open Archives programme series, the objective of which is to contribute to the utilisation of the collections of archives that form a unique and irreplaceable part of our national heritage, to promote the method of using documents of lasting value, and to make the work of archives better known.